Apocalypse, then transforming into a magical girl

The humidity reading on the thermometer stubbornly remained at 36%, but Zhao Jia felt as if he were inside a steamer.

The air conditioner's dehumidification mode is already on the highest setting, but it's completely ineffective.

The company was filled with a nauseating, musty, and sweaty odor.

He was already drenched in sweat, slumped motionless in the chair like a dying slug.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Lao Qian, who was also soaked to the bone, was still enthusiastically browsing the conspiracy theory section of the Xinmao City local forum, namely the [Strange Tales Section].

This partition has completely corrupted Lao Qian.

During his lunch break today, he approached Zhao Jia again to talk to him, telling him that he had found evidence of the existence of magical girls. Zhao Jia gave him a disapproving look, as if he were looking after someone with intellectual disabilities.

Looking around, apart from that oddball, everyone else in the office, affected by the weather, had the same unfocused gaze and tired, anxious expressions.

"The hygrometer is definitely broken," he muttered to himself, pulling out his phone to buy another one, but his fingertips expertly swiped to open the weather forecast.

clear.

Humidity: 37%.

Air quality: Good.

UV intensity: High.

He was speechless. He looked out the window at the yellowish-red smog that resembled thick phlegm, and cursed the people at the meteorological station as incompetent fools who could get two out of four indicators wrong.

There were still two hours left before he got off work, but Zhao Jia didn't want to work for another second.

He was preparing to skip work.

At worst, I can ask someone I know in HR to help me out tomorrow. I can just say I forgot to clock out and ask them to do it for me.

He deliberately made a noise, pulling out several tissues with a whoosh, announcing to the world that he was about to take a paid defecation break, and headed towards the toilet.

Noticing that no one was paying attention to him, he felt at ease and made his way around the blind spot of the surveillance cameras near the restroom to the fire escape, skillfully went down one floor, and then entered the elevator.

As he stepped out of the elevator and walked home, humming a tuneless song, he habitually opened his phone and went to the local forum.

He wanted to post a rant about the awful weather, but the trending posts at the top of the screen made him frown.

[Hot Post] Damn, I feel like I'm in water! But all three hygrometers show only 30+ humidity?

OP: Are you crazy?! My walls are leaking, and my dog ​​is lying on the floor, completely motionless, like he's dead! My neighbor and I have three different hygrometers, all showing 30-40% humidity, but even when the humidity is at full, it's never this outrageous. The air feels sticky, like glue! Anyone else experiencing this?

3rd floor: My underwear that I just hung out to dry has already grown mold in two hours!

7th Floor: It's not just a humidity issue. Don't you guys feel something's off about the outside? I love photography and am particularly sensitive to light, but I've never seen the sky like this before, and it feels incredibly oppressive. Neither my phone nor my camera can capture that feeling!

The posts below also shared their own experiences of the unusual events. A few people attempted to explain it scientifically, but their explanations were completely untenable.

He looked up, staring blankly at the sky that glowed with an eerie red light, a bad feeling creeping over him.

The rusty red mist began to fall at this moment, mixed with a small amount of black dust.

Tiny droplets landed on my skin, causing an itchy sensation as if something was clinging to it. It was very uncomfortable, quite different from the refreshing feeling of ordinary rainwater.

Zhao Jia couldn't tell what was going on, but the itchy sensation on his skin told him that getting caught in the rain was definitely not a good thing.

He jogged into the convenience store on the street corner, grabbed an umbrella, and after noticing that a few people were already buying up supplies, he followed suit and bought some compressed biscuits and instant noodles.

After paying, he carried the heavy shopping bags, opened his umbrella, and walked quickly towards his rented room.

The red rain was now truly falling, unlike the droplets that had been floating in the air before. The umbrella, of course, couldn't protect Zhao Jia's legs; the raindrops fell on them, making him feel very uncomfortable.

He muttered a curse under his breath and quickened his pace.

Fortunately, his home wasn't far away. He forced open the building entrance, took the elevator, took out his key, inserted it into the lock, and the security door clicked open. He slammed the door shut and casually tossed his shopping bag and umbrella aside.

The itching on my calves and ankles got worse, as if something was wriggling on them.

He turned on the living room light, lifted his leg, and wanted to see if there was anything unusual about the areas that had been wet by the rain.

Under the stark white light, he saw a sight he would never forget—

My skin from my ankles to my calves was covered with countless tiny black lines!

Even at their thickest point, these thread-like things were thinner than a strand of hair, and only a millimeter or two in length, yet they seemed to be alive, wriggling in the folds and pores of his skin in a nauseating way.

"?!"

His hair stood on end, and he practically tumbled and crawled towards the bathroom, turning the shower on full blast, the tap water instantly drenching his entire body.

Like tearing a rag, he roughly ripped off his clothes, which were stained with rain filth, and threw them out of the small bathroom window without even looking at them.

He scrubbed his body with all his might, especially his legs, which were covered in black thread-like substances, his fingernails leaving red marks on his skin.

The rushing water quickly washed away the thread-like substance clinging to the skin, and the itching subsided, but the fear of being possessed by a foreign object remained undiminished.

After an unknown amount of time, Zhao Jia finally stopped scrubbing, panting heavily, and leaned against the cold tiles, waiting for the nausea to subside.

"Damn it, what is this thing..." he muttered to himself, filled with lingering fear. "This rain is seriously dangerous; I absolutely cannot touch it, and I definitely cannot drink it..."

Can't drink it?

A thought struck him like lightning: while the water source is still unpolluted!

He suddenly stood up straight, rushed out of the toilet, found all the containers in the house, and filled them with water.

Once all the containers within his sight were filled with water, he casually found a set of clean clothes to put on.

Back in the living room, his gaze fell on the umbrella he had just bought. He opened the door a crack, wrapped his hand in an old rag, and disgustedly tossed it outside.

What...what exactly is that thing? What's going on now?

He felt lost and frightened, and subconsciously opened the local forum's app, hoping to find some information.

A post published two minutes earlier caught his eye: 【Monster in the sewers!!! Real footage!!! Don't go near manhole covers!!!】

The camera was focused on a half-open manhole cover, where a man in blue overalls was mostly submerged, with only his upper body sticking out.

Zhao Jia's pupils contracted sharply. Although the video was shaky, he could still make out that the man's face, neck, and arms were covered with countless black nematodes, much larger than any he had ever seen before.

Not only that, but there were also many palm-sized, leech-like black creatures that clung tightly to his body, wriggling and burrowing.

The man thrashed about wildly, his screams barely audible: "Help! Pull me up! Something's grabbing my leg!! Ah—"

The camera shook even more violently, clearly indicating that the person filming was also in a state of extreme fear.

The next second, an even stronger force suddenly pulled him down, and the man's fingers futilely scratched at the slippery well edge before finally slipping away helplessly.

He was instantly dragged into the well, leaving only a scream that abruptly stopped.

Immediately afterwards, a dull and violent churning sound came from below the manhole, as if some enormous creature was feasting down there.

The person filming let out a sharp scream, and the image began to shake and spin violently, accompanied by his panting and footsteps as he fled—at which point the video abruptly ended.

Then... what is it?

Zhao Jia stared blankly at his phone screen, feeling a chill run through his body.

Just then, a piercing scream came from downstairs, piercing through the glass window and stabbing into Zhao Jia's eardrums with the despair of someone on the verge of death.

His heart skipped a beat. He tiptoed to the balcony, peeked out through a corner of the curtains, and peered through the glass window.

A torrential downpour had begun outside, the blood-red rain curtain washing over the world like a waterfall, reducing visibility to extremely low levels.

But in that thick curtain of rain, Zhao Jia still managed to catch a few blurry and distorted figures.

They were unlike any known creatures; their limbs twisted in a way that defied common sense, moving at an astonishing speed, chasing after several tiny, staggering figures in a bizarre and swift manner.

The figures ran helplessly. Some could no longer run, some fell, and in the end, they were all swallowed up by the shadows amidst cries, disappearing like rain into water.

His heart pounded, and he instinctively took a step back, moving away from the window. The oppressive feeling and fear emanating from the monster's physical form far surpassed what he had seen in the video.

If it were really as Old Qian said, it would be great if a magical girl came out to save the world.

This absurd thought popped into his head. He twitched the corners of his mouth, revealing a bitter smile that looked like a cry.